The more I play with elvish visionary the more I want to play something else. I've found it to lead to clunky draws with heritage druid and to be terrible in the beatdown plan. If I wanted to substitute do you think that more one drops such as essence warden should be played? Or is a different two drop such as metallic mimic worth a shot? I currently run three visionaries in my list.
Do you run Chord or Lead? IMO, 2-drop silver bullets are better i.e. Selfless Spirit, Scavenging Ooze and Spellskite. You could also try 3-drops like Elvish Champion, Eternal Witness and Rec Sag. Playtest them and go from there.
I'm seeing a rise in Ad Nauseam and Tron decks in my country (Philippines) and I think this is the most optimum build against a wide variety of decks. The sideboard is meant to raise G2 & 3 win pct.
I've been running an abzan version similar to Saxe's but with chord in the main. I'm going to mess around with some main board bullets like you suggested as well as some one drops.
Quick explanation behind some card choices:
I don't have gilt-leaf palaces at the moment, if I did I would probably play straight GB
My meta is quite removal heavy, with about 50% of the field being either Jeskai control, Grixis delver, Jund/Abzan or Mardu midrange. There is also regularly about 10-15% of the field on burn. This has lead removing 4x Nettle Sentinel for a 2/2 split between Essence Warden and Narnam Renegade.
Questions:
Is it worth going to a 2/2 split of Chord and Lead in the MB so that I can use Narnam renegade as an ambush viper?
Is Thrun too deviating from the game plan?
Should I play both selfless spirit and forge-tender, or just selfless spirit?
Without Gilt-Leaf Palaces how bad would the deck be if I went straight GB lead version with duress and heroic intervention in the side?
Lost 0-2 against BG Rock
Lost 0-2 against Abzan
Won 2-1 against GW Tron
Won 2-0 against Jeskai Nahiri
Decided to try out Metallic Mimic and I've come to the conclusion that CoCo Elves simply aren't the right shell for it. It does nothing when it hits the board, doesn't affect the other creature when you hit one with CoCo and is generally just too slow. Perhaps it would shine in a build with Bramblewood Paragon, Joraga Warcaller and other Elf Warriors, but it's not enough to warrant a spot in the 75 here.
Lifecrafter's Bestiary on the other hand is something I'll definitely test out more. It costs just 3 which means we can play it on T2 and if it sticks it just keeps providing value. Scry 1 is very valuable since the deck is very light on card filtering outside of Visionary and Collected Company. Where the card really shines is it's Glimpse of Nature-like ability that turns all our dorks into visionaries. With Nettle Sentinels you can even start chaining elves one after the other. In games against GW Tron and Abzan, they used their removal for Bestiary which in turn meant some of my elves were spared. For now I'll be keeping two in my sideboard.
Switched from Dismember to Fatal Push this week and I've been happy with the change. Although I only saw it twice, both times Push was the better choice to have and it saved me 4 life each time.
Going to try out Narnam Renegade next week in place of Mimics.
How would people feel about a Discord server for some live discussion on card choices/instant hotline deck help? I've just seen this in the other threads so I thought maybe we could have one.
If the voice chat is laggy, let me know and I'll try to move the server away from Australia. Either way, hope this can be a channel for more live discussion!
Why not run one of the anti-sacrifice bullets if tron (all is dust) and ad nauseum are big? just curious
All is Dust is very fringe for the most part, and I haven't heard of Ad Nauseam playing sacrifice stuff (I was on Ad Nauseam last week!) - I'm not sure what anti-sacrifice does right now really.
If the voice chat is laggy, let me know and I'll try to move the server away from Australia. Either way, hope this can be a channel for more live discussion!
You need to link the invite url. The link posted doesn't work for me
Hello, elf players! I have a gpt this weekend and I'm moving off GB Lead the Stampede version to GW Chord toolbox, because the midrange decks here are decreasing here, dont know why. Soo, I have not soo much experience piloting this toolbox list. Could anyone help me with a sideboard guide of this kind of list?
I am gonna play the gw list of Liam Lonergam of the invitational. What to expect in this event:
Abzans
Jund
Jeskai Control (what cut for this matchups? 2x Chord? Against jeskai control side in silver bullets like Selfless Spirit is a option?)
Affinity (1x Kataki, 2x F. Gust, 1x Rec Sage, removing 3 Visionaries and maybe 1 Nettle?)
Burn (2x Paths, 2x Finks, 1x Burrenton, removing 3 Visionaries and maybe 1 Ezuri and 1 chord?)
Ad Nauseam (1x Rec Sage, 1x Revoker, 1x Burrenton (to prevent the red spell? or they just go off with the empty draw to win with the blue creature?) taking off 3 visionaries?)
Infect (2x Paths, 1x Melira, removing 3 Visionaries)
Titanshift
UW Spirits
Grixis Delver
Bant Eldrazi
Lantern
Esper Control
Trons
Ad Nauseam runs pact of negation. So even if you were able to respond to the lightning storm with chord of calling they would just counter it for free. If you chorded in response to Ad Nauseam, However, it would work. Eidolon of Rhetoric is another good option for any combo deck. You can respond with a Chord for Eidolon and then they can't play anymore spells that turn. They may have Pact of Negation in hand, but usually they will keep it in the deck as they want to have their combo pieces in hand against elves. At least that's my experience with Ad Nauseam.
Just quickly want to see, does anyone have playtest or match results vs. the new esper decks showing up, and how did it go if so?
I haven't played against it, but I do own a version of it and am building it out.
The biggest threat imo is fatal push on the turn 1 dork when you keep a one lander and snap+push gives them enough outs to our threats. Eventually they will just wipe you. dwynen's elite and nettle sentinel can push through a lot of incidental damage to get them in SotP burn range asap. If they board in yehenni's expertise it's problematic for us, but slower than the more crippling sweepers. LotV isn't much of a threat to us.
Imo slow roll your threats after they get closer to sweeper mana, and chord/coco on their end step to force counters early so you can continue to chip in. Cavern is relevant in this match up.
Also, I think mikeduges was also making a foray into esper lists, so maybe he can share more insight. Maybe shoot him a PM, he has contributed a great deal to the discussion thus far so is familiar with both points of view.
So sounds a lot like grixis, then. Yahenni's is slow but it plays around different than damnation... thats annoying
Similar yeah.
collective brutality is surprisingly potent against us. Every time I play test the decks against each other I'm just like yeh...pitching this trash card in my hand is totally worth that dork/archdruid/coco/lead/chord...every time. It just lines up incredibly well on turns two and three.
If they're on 4 kill spells and 4 snaps, they match up very well to our 2 ezuris, 4 archdruids, 4 SotP. Basically only two cards they can't answer 1 for 1 after resolution.
At least you don't have to worry about electrolyze or izzet staticaster that grixis will run in the side. Those are much more backbreaking in my experience. I think esper is the easier of the two.
Esper has Esper Charm which can dismantle our hand along with Thoughtseize or Inquisition of Kozilek and at instant speed. A friend of mine is putting Esper Transcendent list together so I'll be able to playtest against it once he's done. But as with other control decks, I don't expect it to be an easy matchup.
If the voice chat is laggy, let me know and I'll try to move the server away from Australia. Either way, hope this can be a channel for more live discussion!
You need to link the invite url. The link posted doesn't work for me
Oops!
Here we are! Hoping to see some active discussion in here in the near future.
Esper has Esper Charm which can dismantle our hand along with Thoughtseize or Inquisition of Kozilek and at instant speed. A friend of mine is putting Esper Transcendent list together so I'll be able to playtest against it once he's done. But as with other control decks, I don't expect it to be an easy matchup.
My biggest advice for control is to get in every ounce of damage as possible. I maindeck 4 Cavern of Souls and 3 Lead the Stampede, which tends to put me in a favorable position against most of the control decks (although Gideon Jura really is a problem).
But when I say every ounce of damage, I really mean it. Sometimes this is attacking on turn two with your 1 mana elf and playing two more as opposed to three. This heuristic of attacking more means we aren't as explosive, but the potency of Shaman of the Pack increases and board wipes are less detrimental. It's not with our normal game plan, but I've had a lot of success with it!
I haven't been very active lately, but I should be around more frequently now to help. I am quite suspect of Narnam Renegade as a chord target (which seems to be a frequent conversation of late. I do like it if you maximize fetch lands, so I think I would only want to play it in an abzan deck that has spell-based sideboard slots and maximizes the fetchable mana.
Do you run Chord or Lead? IMO, 2-drop silver bullets are better i.e. Selfless Spirit, Scavenging Ooze and Spellskite. You could also try 3-drops like Elvish Champion, Eternal Witness and Rec Sag. Playtest them and go from there.
4 Elvish Mystic
4 Heritage Druid
4 Llanowar Elves
4 Nettle Sentinel
4 Dwynen's Elite
1 Eternal Witness
1 Selfless Spirit
4 Elvish Archdruid
2 Elvish Visionary
3 Ezuri, Renegade Leader
4 Shaman of the Pack
1 Lead the Stampede
2 Chord of Calling
4 Collected Company
Lands (18)
2 Blooming Marsh
4 Gilt-Leaf Palace
1 Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
2 Horizon Canopy
4 Cavern of Souls
3 Forest
2 Razorverge Thicket
1 Phyrexian Revoker
1 Melira, Sylvok Outcast
2 Reclamation Sage
2 Kitchen Finks
1 Elvish Champion
1 Chameleon Colossus
1 Chord of Calling
1 Eidolon of Rhetoric
1 Heroic Intervention
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Burrenton Forge-Tender
1 Kataki, War's Wage
1 Spellskite
I'm seeing a rise in Ad Nauseam and Tron decks in my country (Philippines) and I think this is the most optimum build against a wide variety of decks. The sideboard is meant to raise G2 & 3 win pct.
4x Elvish Mystic
4x Llanowar Elves
4x Heritage Druid
2x Essence Warden
2x Narnam Renegade
4x Dwynen's Elite
3x Elvish Vissionary
4x Elvish Archdruid
4x Shaman of the Pack
3x Ezuri, Renegade Leader
4x Collected Company
3x Lead the Stampede
1x Chord of Calling
Lands
4x Blooming Marsh
4x Windswept Heath
2x Wooded Foothills
2x Overgrown Tomb
1x Temple Garden
1x Horizon Canopy
1x Westvale Abbey
3x Forest
1x Burrenton Forge-Tender
1x Chameleon Colossus
1x Elvish Champion
1x Melira, Sylvok Outcast
1x Phyrexian Revoker
1x Reclamation Sage
2x Scavenging Ooze
1x Selfless Spirit
1x Spellskite
1x Thrun, the Last Troll
2x Chord of Calling
2x Duress
Quick explanation behind some card choices:
I don't have gilt-leaf palaces at the moment, if I did I would probably play straight GB
My meta is quite removal heavy, with about 50% of the field being either Jeskai control, Grixis delver, Jund/Abzan or Mardu midrange. There is also regularly about 10-15% of the field on burn. This has lead removing 4x Nettle Sentinel for a 2/2 split between Essence Warden and Narnam Renegade.
Questions:
Is it worth going to a 2/2 split of Chord and Lead in the MB so that I can use Narnam renegade as an ambush viper?
Is Thrun too deviating from the game plan?
Should I play both selfless spirit and forge-tender, or just selfless spirit?
Without Gilt-Leaf Palaces how bad would the deck be if I went straight GB lead version with duress and heroic intervention in the side?
Thanks!
4 Llanowar Elves
4 Elvish Mystic
4 Heritage Druid
3 Elvish Visionary
3 Dwynen's Elite
3 Metallic Mimic
4 Elvish Archdruid
3 Ezuri, Renegade Leader
3 Shaman of the Pack
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Spellskite
1 Selfless Spirit
4 Collected Company
3 Chord of Calling
1 Eldritch Evolution
Lands (18):
4 Forest
4 Gilt-Leaf Palace
4 Windswept Heath
3 Razorverge Thicket
1 Temple Garden
1 Overgrown Tomb
1 Pendelhaven
2 Mark of Asylum
2 Fatal Push
2 Essence Warden
2 Lifecrafter's Bestiary
1 Kataki, War's Wage
1 Chameleon Colossus
1 Thrun, the Last Troll
1 Riftsweeper
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Phyrexian Revoker
1 Lead the Stampede
Lost 0-2 against BG Rock
Lost 0-2 against Abzan
Won 2-1 against GW Tron
Won 2-0 against Jeskai Nahiri
Decided to try out Metallic Mimic and I've come to the conclusion that CoCo Elves simply aren't the right shell for it. It does nothing when it hits the board, doesn't affect the other creature when you hit one with CoCo and is generally just too slow. Perhaps it would shine in a build with Bramblewood Paragon, Joraga Warcaller and other Elf Warriors, but it's not enough to warrant a spot in the 75 here.
Lifecrafter's Bestiary on the other hand is something I'll definitely test out more. It costs just 3 which means we can play it on T2 and if it sticks it just keeps providing value. Scry 1 is very valuable since the deck is very light on card filtering outside of Visionary and Collected Company. Where the card really shines is it's Glimpse of Nature-like ability that turns all our dorks into visionaries. With Nettle Sentinels you can even start chaining elves one after the other. In games against GW Tron and Abzan, they used their removal for Bestiary which in turn meant some of my elves were spared. For now I'll be keeping two in my sideboard.
Switched from Dismember to Fatal Push this week and I've been happy with the change. Although I only saw it twice, both times Push was the better choice to have and it saved me 4 life each time.
Going to try out Narnam Renegade next week in place of Mimics.
WBG Elves WBG
Cheeri0s
EDH:
RG Omnath, Locus of Rage RG || GWUB Atraxa, Praetors' Voice GWUB
R Zo-Zu the Punisher R || WU Brago, King Eternal WU
UB Gisa and Geralf UB || BGW Ghave, Guru of Spores BGW
WBG Elves WBG
Cheeri0s
EDH:
RG Omnath, Locus of Rage RG || GWUB Atraxa, Praetors' Voice GWUB
R Zo-Zu the Punisher R || WU Brago, King Eternal WU
UB Gisa and Geralf UB || BGW Ghave, Guru of Spores BGW
Discord link
If the voice chat is laggy, let me know and I'll try to move the server away from Australia. Either way, hope this can be a channel for more live discussion!
All is Dust is very fringe for the most part, and I haven't heard of Ad Nauseam playing sacrifice stuff (I was on Ad Nauseam last week!) - I'm not sure what anti-sacrifice does right now really.
You need to link the invite url. The link posted doesn't work for me
If you see a lot of Living End and All is Dust where you play, Tajuru Preserver is a completely legit option.
WBG Elves WBG
Cheeri0s
EDH:
RG Omnath, Locus of Rage RG || GWUB Atraxa, Praetors' Voice GWUB
R Zo-Zu the Punisher R || WU Brago, King Eternal WU
UB Gisa and Geralf UB || BGW Ghave, Guru of Spores BGW
I am gonna play the gw list of Liam Lonergam of the invitational. What to expect in this event:
Abzans
Jund
Jeskai Control (what cut for this matchups? 2x Chord? Against jeskai control side in silver bullets like Selfless Spirit is a option?)
Affinity (1x Kataki, 2x F. Gust, 1x Rec Sage, removing 3 Visionaries and maybe 1 Nettle?)
Burn (2x Paths, 2x Finks, 1x Burrenton, removing 3 Visionaries and maybe 1 Ezuri and 1 chord?)
Ad Nauseam (1x Rec Sage, 1x Revoker, 1x Burrenton (to prevent the red spell? or they just go off with the empty draw to win with the blue creature?) taking off 3 visionaries?)
Infect (2x Paths, 1x Melira, removing 3 Visionaries)
Titanshift
UW Spirits
Grixis Delver
Bant Eldrazi
Lantern
Esper Control
Trons
What thoughts about it? Thanks to all
I haven't played against it, but I do own a version of it and am building it out.
The biggest threat imo is fatal push on the turn 1 dork when you keep a one lander and snap+push gives them enough outs to our threats. Eventually they will just wipe you. dwynen's elite and nettle sentinel can push through a lot of incidental damage to get them in SotP burn range asap. If they board in yehenni's expertise it's problematic for us, but slower than the more crippling sweepers. LotV isn't much of a threat to us.
Imo slow roll your threats after they get closer to sweeper mana, and chord/coco on their end step to force counters early so you can continue to chip in. Cavern is relevant in this match up.
Also, I think mikeduges was also making a foray into esper lists, so maybe he can share more insight. Maybe shoot him a PM, he has contributed a great deal to the discussion thus far so is familiar with both points of view.
Similar yeah.
collective brutality is surprisingly potent against us. Every time I play test the decks against each other I'm just like yeh...pitching this trash card in my hand is totally worth that dork/archdruid/coco/lead/chord...every time. It just lines up incredibly well on turns two and three.
If they're on 4 kill spells and 4 snaps, they match up very well to our 2 ezuris, 4 archdruids, 4 SotP. Basically only two cards they can't answer 1 for 1 after resolution.
At least you don't have to worry about electrolyze or izzet staticaster that grixis will run in the side. Those are much more backbreaking in my experience. I think esper is the easier of the two.
WBG Elves WBG
Cheeri0s
EDH:
RG Omnath, Locus of Rage RG || GWUB Atraxa, Praetors' Voice GWUB
R Zo-Zu the Punisher R || WU Brago, King Eternal WU
UB Gisa and Geralf UB || BGW Ghave, Guru of Spores BGW
Oops!
Here we are! Hoping to see some active discussion in here in the near future.
WBG Elves WBG
Cheeri0s
EDH:
RG Omnath, Locus of Rage RG || GWUB Atraxa, Praetors' Voice GWUB
R Zo-Zu the Punisher R || WU Brago, King Eternal WU
UB Gisa and Geralf UB || BGW Ghave, Guru of Spores BGW
My biggest advice for control is to get in every ounce of damage as possible. I maindeck 4 Cavern of Souls and 3 Lead the Stampede, which tends to put me in a favorable position against most of the control decks (although Gideon Jura really is a problem).
But when I say every ounce of damage, I really mean it. Sometimes this is attacking on turn two with your 1 mana elf and playing two more as opposed to three. This heuristic of attacking more means we aren't as explosive, but the potency of Shaman of the Pack increases and board wipes are less detrimental. It's not with our normal game plan, but I've had a lot of success with it!
I haven't been very active lately, but I should be around more frequently now to help. I am quite suspect of Narnam Renegade as a chord target (which seems to be a frequent conversation of late. I do like it if you maximize fetch lands, so I think I would only want to play it in an abzan deck that has spell-based sideboard slots and maximizes the fetchable mana.
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